What's New

The business mileage rate for 2015 is 57.5 cents per mile. You may use this rate to reimburse an employee for business use of a personal vehicle, and under certain conditions, you may use the rate under the cents-per-mile rule to value the personal use of a vehicle you provide to an employee. See
Cents-Per-Mile Rule in section 3.

For 2015, the monthly exclusion for qualified parking is $250 and the monthly exclusion for commuter highway vehicle transportation and transit passes is $130. See
Qualified Transportation Benefits in section 2.

For plan years beginning after December 31, 2014, a cafeteria plan may not allow an employee to request salary reduction contributions for a health FSA in excess of $2,550. For more information, see
Cafeteria Plans in section 1.

Notice 2014-55, 2014-41 I.R.B. 672, available at
www.irs.gov/irb/2014-41_IRB/ar12.html, expands the application of the permitted change rules for health coverage under a cafeteria plan and discusses two specific situations in which a cafeteria plan participant is permitted to revoke his or her election under a cafeteria plan during a period of
coverage.

Reminders

For federal tax purposes, individuals of the same sex are considered married if they were lawfully married in a state (or foreign country) whose laws authorize the marriage of two individuals of the same sex, even if the state (or foreign country) in which they now live does not recognize same-sex marriage. For more information, see Revenue Ruling 2013-17, 2013-38 I.R.B. 201, available at
www.irs.gov/irb/2013-38_IRB/ar07.html. Notice 2013-61 provides special administrative procedures for employers to make claims for refund or adjustments of overpayments of social security and Medicare taxes with respect to certain same-sex spouse benefits before expiration of the period of limitations. Notice 2013-61, 2013-44 I.R.B. 432, is available at
www.irs.gov/irb/2013-44_IRB/ar10.html.

In addition to withholding Medicare tax at 1.45%, you must withhold a 0.9% Additional Medicare Tax from wages you pay to an employee in excess of $200,000 in a calendar year. You are required to begin withholding Additional Medicare Tax in the pay period in which you pay wages in excess of $200,000 to an employee and continue to withhold it each pay period until the end of the calendar year. Additional Medicare Tax is only imposed on the employee. There is no employer share of Additional Medicare Tax. All wages that are subject to Medicare tax are subject to Additional Medicare Tax withholding if paid in excess of the $200,000 withholding threshold. Unless otherwise noted, references to Medicare tax include Additional Medicare
Tax.

For more information on what wages are subject to Medicare tax, see Table 2-1,
later, and the chart,
Special Rules for Various Types of Services and Payments, in section 15 of Publication 15, (Circular E), Employer's Tax Guide. For more information on Additional Medicare Tax, visit IRS.gov and enter "Additional Medicare Tax" in the search
box.

The IRS is a proud partner with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Photographs of missing children selected by the Center may appear in this publication on pages that would otherwise be blank. You can help bring these children home by looking at the photographs and calling 1-800-THE-LOST (1-800-843-5678) if you recognize a
child.

1. Fringe Benefit Overview

A fringe benefit is a form of pay for the performance of services. For example, you provide an employee with a fringe benefit when you allow the employee to use a business vehicle to commute to and from
work.

Performance of services.

A person who performs services for you does not have to be your employee. A person may perform services for you as an independent contractor, partner, or director. Also, for fringe benefit purposes, treat a person who agrees not to perform services (such as under a covenant not to compete) as performing
services.

Provider of benefit.

You are the provider of a fringe benefit if it is provided for services performed for you. You are considered the provider of a fringe benefit even if a third party, such as your client or customer, provides the benefit to your employee for services the employee performs for you. For example, if, in exchange for goods or services, your customer provides day care services as a fringe benefit to your employees for services they provide for you as their employer, then you are the provider of this fringe benefit even though the customer is actually providing the day
care.

Recipient of benefit.

The person who performs services for you is considered the recipient of a fringe benefit provided for those services. That person may be considered the recipient even if the benefit is provided to someone who did not perform services for you. For example, your employee may be the recipient of a fringe benefit you provide to a member of the employee's
family.

Are Fringe Benefits Taxable?

Any fringe benefit you provide is taxable and must be included in the recipient's pay unless the law specifically excludes it. Section 2 discusses the exclusions that apply to certain fringe benefits. Any benefit not excluded under the rules discussed in section 2 is
taxable.

Including taxable benefits in pay.

You must include in a recipient's pay the amount by which the value of a fringe benefit is more than the sum of the following amounts.

Any amount the law excludes from pay.

Any amount the recipient paid for the benefit.

The rules used to determine the value of a fringe benefit are discussed in section
3.

If the recipient of a taxable fringe benefit is your employee, the benefit is subject to employment taxes and must be reported on Form W-2, Wage and Tax Statement. However, you can use special rules to withhold, deposit, and report the employment taxes. These rules are discussed in section
4.

If the recipient of a taxable fringe benefit is not your employee, the benefit is not subject to employment taxes. However, you may have to report the benefit on one of the following information returns.

Cafeteria Plans

A cafeteria plan, including a flexible spending arrangement, is a written plan that allows your employees to choose between receiving cash or taxable benefits instead of certain qualified benefits for which the law provides an exclusion from wages. If an employee chooses to receive a qualified benefit under the plan, the fact that the employee could have received cash or a taxable benefit instead will not make the qualified benefit
taxable.

Generally, a cafeteria plan does not include any plan that offers a benefit that defers pay. However, a cafeteria plan can include a qualified 401(k) plan as a benefit. Also, certain life insurance plans maintained by educational institutions can be offered as a benefit even though they defer
pay.

"Use-or-lose" rule for health FSAs.

Instead of a grace period, you may, at your option, amend your cafeteria plan to allow up to $500 of an employee's unused contributions to carryover to the immediately following plan year. For more information, see Notice 2013-71, 2013-47 I.R.B. 532, available at
www.irs.gov/irb/2013-47_IRB/ar10.html.

Do not treat a 2% shareholder of an S corporation as an employee of the corporation for this purpose. A 2% shareholder for this purpose is someone who directly or indirectly owns (at any time during the year) more than 2% of the corporation's stock or stock with more than 2% of the voting power. Treat a 2% shareholder as you would a partner in a partnership for fringe benefit purposes, but do not treat the benefit as a reduction in distributions to the 2%
shareholder.

Plans that favor highly compensated employees.

If your plan favors highly compensated employees as to eligibility to participate, contributions, or benefits, you must include in their wages the value of taxable benefits they could have selected. A plan you maintain under a collective bargaining agreement does not favor highly compensated
employees.

A highly compensated employee for this purpose is any of the following employees.

An officer.

A shareholder who owns more than 5% of the voting power or value of all classes of the employer's
stock.

An employee who is highly compensated based on the facts and
circumstances.

Plans that favor key employees.

If your plan favors key employees, you must include in their wages the value of taxable benefits they could have selected. A plan favors key employees if more than 25% of the total of the nontaxable benefits you provide for all employees under the plan go to key employees. However, a plan you maintain under a collective bargaining agreement does not favor key
employees.

A key employee during 2015 is generally an employee who is either of the
following.

Simple Cafeteria Plans

Eligible employers meeting contribution requirements and eligibility and participation requirements can establish a simple cafeteria plan. Simple cafeteria plans are treated as meeting the nondiscrimination requirements of a cafeteria plan and certain benefits under a cafeteria plan.

Eligible employer.

You are an eligible employer if you employ an average of 100 or fewer employees during either of the 2 preceding years. If your business was not in existence throughout the preceding year, you are eligible if you reasonably expect to employ an average of 100 or fewer employees in the current year. If you establish a simple cafeteria plan in a year that you employ an average of 100 or fewer employees, you are considered an eligible employer for any subsequent year as long as you do not employ an average of 200 or more employees in a subsequent year.

Eligibility and participation requirements.

These requirements are met if all employees who had at least 1,000 hours of service for the preceding plan year are eligible to participate and each employee eligible to participate in the plan may elect any benefit available under the plan. You may elect to exclude from the plan employees
who:

Are under age 21 before the close of the plan year,

Have less than 1 year of service with you as of any day during the plan
year,

Are covered under a collective bargaining agreement, or

Are nonresident aliens working outside the United States whose income did not come from a U.S.
source.

Contribution requirements.

You must make a contribution to provide qualified benefits on behalf of each qualified employee in an amount equal to:

A uniform percentage (not less than 2%) of the employee’s compensation for the plan year,
or

An amount which is at least 6% of the employee’s compensation for the plan year or twice the amount of the salary reduction contributions of each qualified employee, whichever is
less.

If the contribution requirements are met using option (2), the rate of contribution to any salary reduction contribution of a highly compensated or key employee can not be greater than the rate of contribution to any other
employee.